TV shows in which cast members have ended relationships during their runs

It's pretty well known that Michael C. Hall (Dexter, from Dexter) met, married, and subsequently divorced his costar Jennifer Carpenter (Deb). It's a testament to their acting abilities that none of that comes across on screen, but I'm sure it creates a strange work environment.

Anyway, this can't be the only time this happened. What other TV shows have featured actors who have ended personal relationships with each other, yet still had to see each other every day on set?

Nikki Cox was linked to Kevin Connolly on their show Unhappily Ever After before getting engaged to her other co-star, Bobcat Goldthwait. Then she was dating Josh Duhamel on Vegas before she left the show, but they may have broken up earlier. She's now married to Jay Mohr.

There's a woman who looks beneath the surface, at least 75% of the time.

If Saturday Night Live counts, how about Fred Armisen and Abby Elliott? They had a relationship while working together which ended before she was fired from the show before this season.

(FYI, while looking her up I discovered that she's Chris Elliott's daughter - had no idea).

Sure it counts! Bill Murray and Gilda Radner had a thang for about a year, broke up, and continued to work on the show through the end of season 5. Dan Aykroyd had a rather open affair with Rosie Schuster, Lorne Michaels' wife at the time; I gather all three of them had an unusually deep commitment to the philosophy of Free Love, as Lorne and Dan displayed no overt friction over the matter.

A different sort of relationship soured behind the scenes of Planet Cosby: Bill Cosby and Lisa Bonet had a falling-out (reportedly over her participation in Angel Heart), causing Bill to fire his TV daughter from her own show and be conspicuously absent from any reunions on his.

Jennifer Morrison and Jesse Spencer got engaged to each & subsequently split up while they were both major players on "House".

They get extra points because after they got together, got engaged, then split their characters on the show got together, got engaged, got married, then got divorced. Makes my head hurt thinking about it (especially considering how unbelievably cute Jennifer Morrison is!)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wendell Wagner

Which means that Chris and Abby are the only parent and child cast members on Saturday Night Live (and Bob appeared once in a small role).

Actually Bob & Ray hosted the show very early in its run. The one bit I remember was the girls singing a then Rod Stewart hit, and they cut to Bob & Ray to sing the chorus. Was pretty funny seeing these two old guys belt out, "If you want my body, and you think I'm sexy..."

Nikki Cox was linked to Kevin Connolly on their show Unhappily Ever After before getting engaged to her other co-star, Bobcat Goldthwait. Then she was dating Josh Duhamel on Vegas before she left the show, but they may have broken up earlier. She's now married to Jay Mohr.

There's a woman who looks beneath the surface, at least 75% of the time.

also - Kaley Cuoco & Johnny Galecki had a fairly long relationship during the beginning of Big Bang Theory's run. They aren't seeing each other any more, but are still costarring.

This one really doesn't count. First of all, the "relationship" was only announced by publicists after the fact. This surprised a lot of people who know them. Secondly, Galecki is notorious for having "girlfriends" for PR purposes. E.g., one of his former "girlfriends" is Sara Gilbert, who is now an out lesbian. (And so, no, she doesn't count either. Not for them on Roseanne or on TBBT.)

John Cleese and Connie Booth co-wrote and co-starred in Fawlty Towers - and their marriage broke up - ending in divorce during the first run of the show.

Their marriage had been under strain for some time due to their clashing work schedules. At one time Cleese would (literally as my brother observed) run from the BBC studios where he was filming Python to the theatre she was performing at as it was the only time they got to see each other all week. Doing a project together had been a last ditch attempt to save the marriage.

This one really doesn't count. First of all, the "relationship" was only announced by publicists after the fact. This surprised a lot of people who know them. Secondly, Galecki is notorious for having "girlfriends" for PR purposes. E.g., one of his former "girlfriends" is Sara Gilbert, who is now an out lesbian. (And so, no, she doesn't count either. Not for them on Roseanne or on TBBT.)

I don't get this at all. How does it matter if the public knew whether they were dating? They did. Whatever affected them because of their relationship or end of it was a work issue at every moment, exactly as the OP asked about.

Are you honestly saying that they never had a relationship at all and that it was made up after the fact for some bizarre PR reason? Why would either of them do it or go along with it? No one has ever denied it. And since when does a later announcement of a preference preclude dating the opposite sex when younger?

Besides, he didn't make the announcement. She did. How does that fit into your theory?

With all of the discussion about Abby Elliott, why is no one mentioning the single most interesting factoid possible about this little sidebar digression?

To wit, Abby Elliott claimed that she was forced to drop out of college BECAUSE A MOUSE URINATED ON HER EYEBALL WHILE SHE WAS SLEEPING.

In the entire rich & storied history of children coming up with farfetched, bizarre, and truly incredible excuses to their family in order to justify bailing on their school (in her case Marymount Manhattan College) has there ever been one that can top this?

Sadly, I never paid much attention to Ms. Elliott back when she was on SNL, but I now have a newfound respect and admiration for the young ingenue, and am going to seek her out to gain her counsel the very next time that I need an excuse as for why I was clocked doing 59 in a 25 MPH zone...

I don't get this at all. How does it matter if the public knew whether they were dating? They did. Whatever affected them because of their relationship or end of it was a work issue at every moment, exactly as the OP asked about.

Are you honestly saying that they never had a relationship at all and that it was made up after the fact for some bizarre PR reason? Why would either of them do it or go along with it? No one has ever denied it. And since when does a later announcement of a preference preclude dating the opposite sex when younger?

Besides, he didn't make the announcement. She did. How does that fit into your theory?

No, there was no actual relationship. No one believes it actually happened. Galecki, at the very least, needed a beard. There's a lot of rumors about his sexuality and for some reason he needs to appear to be straight. (And straight or gay, I don't see what the problem is. It doesn't seem to have hurt his co-star Jim Parsons to be out. And if he's straight, who cares?) The PR machine was already at work before your linked article.

It is really not believable that two people at this level of fame to have had a real relationship for two years and no one knew about it.

Their marriage had been under strain for some time due to their clashing work schedules. At one time Cleese would (literally as my brother observed) run from the BBC studios where he was filming Python to the theatre she was performing at as it was the only time they got to see each other all week. Doing a project together had been a last ditch attempt to save the marriage.

Coincidently this is how I Love Lucy started. The Arnazes' marriage was on the rocks, and when CBS wanted to turn her radio show, My Favorite Husband, into a TV series Ball saw it as a chance to work with her husband and keep them both in LA (instead of moving NYC, where most TV shows were made). In their case it worked, for almost a decade.

No, there was no actual relationship. No one believes it actually happened. Galecki, at the very least, needed a beard. There's a lot of rumors about his sexuality and for some reason he needs to appear to be straight. (And straight or gay, I don't see what the problem is. It doesn't seem to have hurt his co-star Jim Parsons to be out. And if he's straight, who cares?) The PR machine was already at work before your linked article.

The idea that a moderately famous actor known for his nerdiness would need a beard in 2012 is absurd. Also, I don't care if Sara Gilbert is currently a lesbian, if you don't understand why he'd want to date her, you're either over the age of 35 or under the age of 28.

For those of us of a certain age (and a certain nerdy bent), Sara Gilbert was our dream girl.

The idea that a moderately famous actor known for his nerdiness would need a beard in 2012 is absurd. Also, I don't care if Sara Gilbert is currently a lesbian, if you don't understand why he'd want to date her, you're either over the age of 35 or under the age of 28.

For those of us of a certain age (and a certain nerdy bent), Sara Gilbert was our dream girl.

Sara Gilbert just might be my dream girl and I am 43 and a straight woman.

In the WWF, Macho Man Randy Savage and Miss Elizabeth got kayfabe-married at Wrestlemania around the same time that their real-life marriage was falling apart. When they finally divorced, she disappeared from the WWF- but when Macho switched to WCW a few years later, Elizabeth reappeared as his valet and kayfabe-wife as well. (Until she shacked up with Lex Luger and became his manager, of course.)

Yeah, '81 would have been weird, as Curtain, Radner, and Newman were all gone by then. Maybe it had been on the shelf for a while? More likely, it originally ran earlier but NBC did air a rerun in '81, after it became clear no one was watching the SNL S6 cast.

Star Trek: DS9's Nana Visitor and Alexander Siddig got together and married during the show's run. Their marriage outlasted the show by a couple years, but I'm reasonably sure I heard they'd already separated before the last episode. I might be wrong.

Star Trek: DS9's Nana Visitor and Alexander Siddig got together and married during the show's run. Their marriage outlasted the show by a couple years, but I'm reasonably sure I heard they'd already separated before the last episode. I might be wrong.

There's enough additional wierdness in that one, in that Visitor's pregnancy got written into the show by her character becoming the surrogate for the characters played by Colm Meaney and Rosalind Chao, hence Siddig's character, a doctor, had to play scenes where he was pretending to give prenatal care to a colleague who was carrying someone else's baby, opposite his future wife who was carrying his own.

From the cast of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Nana Visitor (Major Kira) and Siddiq el Fadil/Alexander Siddiq (Dr. Bashir) met on set, had a child in 1996, were married in 1997, and divorced in 2001. The show's run was over by the time of the divorce... so I guess this isn't exactly the answer you were looking for.

Jerry Doyle and Andrea Thompson worked together on Babylon 5, and got married in 1995. But Andrea left the show that same year. They divorced in 1997, but she was no longer on the show at that time. So not exactly what you were looking for.

In the WWF, Macho Man Randy Savage and Miss Elizabeth got kayfabe-married at Wrestlemania around the same time that their real-life marriage was falling apart. When they finally divorced, she disappeared from the WWF- but when Macho switched to WCW a few years later, Elizabeth reappeared as his valet and kayfabe-wife as well. (Until she shacked up with Lex Luger and became his manager, of course.)

This happens a LOT in wrestling, but to be fair some of the offscreen relationships aren't put "onscreen", ie incorporated into the character's histories. But there's a couple of very notorious exceptions.

Lita was on-and-offscreen involved with Matt Hardy, then in storyline (kayfabe) got pregnant by and married Kane. She then play-play cheated on Kane with Edge and then for real-real cheated on Matt Hardy with Edge. Then she and Edge were put together as a villainous couple, and eventually kayfabe got married (they split up in real life). To continue the weirdness, years later Lita has a very ambiguous relationship offscreen with CM Punk, while CM Punk's ex Beth Phoenix is now with... get ready for it... Edge! All these people are wrestlers, btw.

But by far the most tragic example is that of Chris Benoit and his wife, Nancy. Nancy was originally married to another wrestler named Kevin Sullivan, and Sullivan came up with a storyline in which she'd be cheating on him with Chris Benoit. Only thing was, Chris and Nancy got together for real and she left Sullivan for him. Fast-forward a few years, Chris Benoit has a total meltdown and murders Nancy, their 7-year-old son, and then kills himself.

No, there was no actual relationship. No one believes it actually happened. Galecki, at the very least, needed a beard. There's a lot of rumors about his sexuality and for some reason he needs to appear to be straight. (And straight or gay, I don't see what the problem is. It doesn't seem to have hurt his co-star Jim Parsons to be out. And if he's straight, who cares?) The PR machine was already at work before your linked article.

It is really not believable that two people at this level of fame to have had a real relationship for two years and no one knew about it.

So, no. Doesn't count in terms of this thread topic.

That is one of the most ridiculous things I have ever read here. Ok not Sandusky thread level but pretty ridiculous. There is no indication that he is gay. He is private but has had a string of very attractive girlfriends. He apparently is still dating Kelli Garner from the canceled show Pan Am. When asked about why he doesn't defend himself from gay rumors he said, "Why defend yourself against something that's not offensive?"

"No one believes it happened?" As far as I can see you are the only one who thinks it didn't. He is just a private person who doesn't like to discuss his private life.

Loach - great post. agree completely. I tried to say this in a reply earlier but couldn't find the words.

I have never heard of a retroactive beard before. I have heard of keeping a relationship secret at work so things aren't awkward. I kept my relationship with my now exwife secret at work for almost a year. She worked in the cubicle I front of me. No one knew. I understand the reasoning. If you read between the lines Cuoco was not happy about it. She did not like the secrecy.

To my thinking this scenario is a lot like Doctor Strangelove. The whole purpose of a Doomsday Device is lost if no one knows about it. It makes no sense to have a secret beard. It's the boyfriend that is supposed to be secret. And what does Cuoco get out of it? She has become a big star because of the show. It adds nothing to her stardom. It makes no sense for it to be fake.